Real or Fake? – Confusion of Imagination of a City

„Oh, look, this place looks like Venice, with the gondolas and all.“

Such sentences are no rarity today, because as we heard in the last blog post, almost everyone has a certain image in mind while thinking of a well-known city. Recurring associations of a place, concise elements that emerge, stand out and characterize a city or a whole country. These associations often belong to the so-called landmarks of a city. Places that are probably on everyone’s „Bucket list“, so anyone who has ever been to New York has seen the Statue of Liberty, the World Trade Centre and the Times Square. In Paris, however, hardly anyone will leave the city without having seen the Eiffel Tower. In this way each city forms its own image by its sights or turning this angle upside down, the image of a city is shaped through the associations of people or the mediated content about one specific city.

24 Sept 2019 0

The blurry Line: Cities in Movies and Reality

„That’s exactly how I imagined it, I’ve seen it in a movie.“

Did you ever heard someone saying this?

20 Sept 2019 0

I ♥ New York & the Story of an Urban Identity

Nowadays the well-known slogan „I ♥…“ appears in relation to thousands of cities. Ranging from being printed on items, being used in fashion and spread all over media channels. It’s a symbolical declaration of love towards a city.

17 Sept 2019 0

Cosmopolitanism – In Singapore

Cosmopolitanism, why it is an interesting topic for our blog?

We want to look at how people and/or the media form the urban. We don’t want to see the city here as a closed container, because as we already learned in the blog post about the city’s formless boundaries, there are no clear boundaries. This is also what cosmopolitanism is about: The NOT belonging to a certain society, nation, group or city, but being part of the so-called human species or the world society.

14 Sept 2019 0

The Urban Phenomen of Social Cohension

Last time we looked at who we were talking about: Urban society and the role of media. Today we look at the topic of social cohesion in urban society. How does this produce and shape urban space?

8 Sept 2019 0

The City’s formless Boundaries

Cities are like a magnet. They are growing and are the preferred living place (instead of villages). City life is attracting many people. People are moving into cities. The reasons for that are different. Some are getting attracted by the hard components the cities offer: Job opportunities and close distances for instance. Others are torn towards due to rather soft complements: the vivid city life and the excitement a city is transmitting.

So, now we always said “city”, but what is about the term “the urban”?

25 Aug 2019 0

The Mediated Urban – Our Idea

Now you know who we are, two girls who study humangeography, who like to go out meet friends and enjoy city live. In this blog we would like to talk with you about a big topic of our studies – the urban, media and urban society. Who doesn’t want to know what is happening around you, how things are connected and what is changing?

15 Aug 2019 0

About us

We, Kathi and Ramona, are students at the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz, Germany. Currently, we are in our 2nd semester in which media geography is one of our key topics. This blog is part of our seminar about Applied Media Geography. Our Master program is called Human Geography: Globalisation, Media and Culture.

14 Aug 2019 0